I’ve been reflecting lately on the term “zero sum game.”
It’s one of those phrases that gets thrown around often in business, particularly in negotiations. The idea is simple: in a zero-sum game, one party’s gain is another’s loss. If I win, you lose. If you win, I lose. The sum of our outcomes is zero. In this view, everything is a battle where only one can come out ahead.
This concept seems especially prevalent in commercial real estate transactions when the market is hedged in favor or a buyer or seller. Think about it. There’s a property on the table, and both buyer and seller have their own goals, seemingly at odds.
The seller wants the highest possible price; the buyer, the lowest. It’s easy to fall into the mindset that for one side to succeed, the other must suffer.
We’re typically led to believe that every negotiation is a zero-sum game where our only option is to win, no matter the cost to the other party.
But is that really the case? Can a deal only close if someone loses?
I’ve found that in reality, this approach is not only limiting but often counterproductive.
Commercial real estate transactions are rarely a simple equation of plus one, minus one. The complexity of the deals, the relationships at play, and the long-term impacts on both parties are far too intricate to be boiled down to mere numbers on a scoreboard.
In my experience, the most successful transactions aren’t the ones where someone walks away feeling like they’ve “won” at the expense of the other. Instead, they’re the deals where both parties come away feeling satisfied, where both sides can say they’ve achieved something valuable. This is what we mean by a win-win situation.
A true win-win transaction takes into account the broader picture. It’s about finding common ground, identifying shared interests, and creating value for both parties. It might mean being flexible, thinking creatively, or looking beyond the immediate financials to consider the long-term…
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